The Embodied Mind
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The Embodied Mind Report of a symposium held at the Squire Bancroft Studio, Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London, 12 December 2008 CONTENTS INTRODUCTION to this report: Siân Ede ................................................... 2 PROGRAMME for the day: Professor Raymond Tallis ............................... 5 REPORT on the Symposium SESSION ONE: Professor Jonathan Cole, Siobhan Davies and Deborah Saxon .. 6 SESSION TWO: Suzy Willson, John Wright, Matt Steer and Rachel Donovan ......11 SESSION THREE: Wayne McGregor, Scott deLahunta and Dr Phil Barnard.........13 SESSION FOUR: Professor Antonio Damasio ........................................................15 SESSION FIVE: Ken Rea and Dr Mark Lythgoe .....................................................17 SESSION SIX: Lorna Marshall and Nicola Hancock ...............................................19 SESSION SEVEN: Professor Raymond Tallis.........................................................21 SPEAKERS’ Biographies ............................................................................ 22 LIST of Participants ..................................................................................... 26 APPENDIX: Ken Rea’s Notes ..................................................................... 30 The Embodied Mind 2 INTRODUCTION Siân Ede, Arts Director UK Branch, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Background to the Symposium The UK Branch of the Gulbenkian Foundation has a 12 year history of encouraging artists to engage with new thinking and practice in science and technology, through open grants programmes,1 salons, symposia and conferences, commissioned anthologies and books, and through contributions to debates and publications nationally and internationally. Salons are organised to bring together experts from the arts and sciences and from philosophy and psychology, to air ideas around particular topics. The idea for this symposium arose from an informal conversation I had had with geriatrician, philosopher and writer Professor Raymond Tallis around our shared understanding that the human mind has evolved by means of interactions with the physical world through the body, that the mind therefore is ‘embodied’ and, for that matter, the body ‘enminded’ – as Antonio Damasio was to point out at the Symposium, introducing his term, ‘en-minded body’. Ray has written much about his interest in phenomenology, the study of structures of consciousness as experienced from the first-person point of view, and has, of course, had years of first-hand (interesting metaphor) experience as a medical doctor. I have worked in the arts all my professional life with a background in theatre, and had a hunch that some of the recent ideas emerging from neuroscience would be recognised by theatre and dance practitioners and teachers who are daily thinking through their bodies, investigating ways of communicating that might have been influenced by the great theorist/ practitioners in their fields – Stanislavsky, Laban, Lecoq, Japanese Noh theatre, and so on – but which are further developed along personal trajectories. Ray expressed an interest in exploring the ways in which physical form might influence people’s states of mind. He talked about observing old people slumped unhappily in their nursing home chairs. If they were encouraged to change something as simple as their posture, they might feel different. I was intrigued by this. There is an orthodoxy in popular psychology that our feelings influence our physical behaviour and not the other way round. In performance theory, Method acting has a similarly perceived orthodoxy. I was reminded of the joke in which an American Method actor (I think it was Dustin Hoffman or Marlon Brando) is said to have described to the distinguished British actor Sir John Gielgud how much work he had undertaken to get into his role by trying almost literally to live and feel the part. To which Gielgud is said to have retorted, ‘But why don’t you just act, dear boy?’ How far are there distinctions between actually being in the moment and simulating being in the moment? What is the relationship between Function and Form? These were questions being examined in both performance studies and neuroscience and each could learn from the other. A lot of neuroscientific discovery has been made through observing people with brain dysfunction, highlighting, for example, functional areas in the brain’s anatomy, its likely neural pathways, or by identifying particular genes associated with the dysfunction, in order better to comprehend the workings of the ‘normal’ brain. By contrast, dance and theatre practitioners possess a superfunction, training themselves to observe their own processes, attaining often astonishing feats of ‘body memory’, spatial awareness and unspoken physical communication with each other and with audiences, and turning this into a new composition, a work of art. Clinicians are sometimes amazed by the brain/body’s determination to cope with injury or illness, its flexibility and plasticity, and an insight into this could inspire dance and theatre artists not just to understand and challenge their own practice but to create new artworks that 1 Now no longer in operation. The Embodied Mind 3 communicate differently. It would be fascinating for both sides to learn more about the ideas of the other. In addition to this, there were things to be learned from and by health practitioners who are daily in touch with their patients’ experience of being ‘unwell’. The interfaces between ‘normality’ and illness, between objective and subjective experience, between mind and body are tenuous. Outline of the Day There are two basic rules to the Gulbenkian Salon: no one is to discuss funding or money; no question is too stupid. Academics and practitioners must leave their professional pride at the door and be prepared to listen and learn. The Symposium is a larger version – an invited audience so there is a manageable number of active participants (in this case 85) and instead of a general, though chaired discussion, there is a series of presentations, usually of arts and science practitioners who have actually worked together or who can present reciprocal views. For the Embodied Mind Symposium, there were some obvious choices: Choreographer and director Siobhan (Sue) Davies and neuroscientist Jonathan Cole discovered each other at a Symposium on Neuroscience and Dance we held in November 2007(report available from our website: www.gulbenkian.org.uk/publications/arts/mind-brain- and-performance) and have since been in discussion. Sue wanted to involve dance artist Deborah Saxon to demonstrate a performance of a dance piece recently created. Theatre director Suzy Willson of The Clod Ensemble has pioneered Performing Medicine, an award-winning course for medical students; she suggested pairing up with Britain’s leading authority on mask work, director and performer, John Wright, and invited actors Matt Steer and Rachel Donovan to give demonstrations. Choreographer Wayne MacGregor has been working closely with arts researcher Scott deLahunta and neuroscientist Phil Barnard for some years, undertaking ground-breaking scientific research into the mental processes involved in creating dance and, in turn, making new dance pieces inspired by an exposure to science and clinical medicine. For the afternoon sessions, we brought together two pairs of speakers: acting teacher Ken Rea and neuroscientist Mark Lythgoe; theatre teacher Lorna Marshall and physiotherapist Nicola Hancock, both pairs of whom I had introduced to each other previously and who had found an immediate rapport. Besides these pairings we were fortunate to be able to invite two prestigious speakers to ground the practice research in conceptual thinking. The neuroscientist and writer Antonio Damasio is much respected in the arts world for his research into the emergence and significance of emotions and feelings in humans. Suzy Willson had invited him to participate in a series of talks on Performing Medicine, giving a public lecture at Tate Modern and a private session for director Katie Mitchell and actors at the National Theatre Studio, and Gulbenkian was pleased to support his visit. Raymond Tallis has been a practising geriatrician and important adviser on public health, an author of a number of books on philosophy, much persuaded by the writings of a number of significant theorists and philosophers also highly respected by arts academics. All the audience/participants were themselves experts in their fields, coming from the range of disciplines embraced by the general term ‘neuroscience’ (anatomists, experimental psychologists, brain imaging experts, physiologists, clinicians, physiotherapists, and so on) and The Embodied Mind 4 within the general term ‘performance’ (artists from dance, mime, mask-work, theatre, physical theatre, performance art, poetry, and so on). In fact, everyone present already subscribed to the notion of the Embodied Mind – there were no Cartesians in the room. The contribution of these participants enriched the day, although it is impossible to reflect the many expert responses in the final plenary session. Great thanks must go to all concerned. This includes the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (RADA) for providing a working arts laboratory, while allowing the scientists to show their work through efficient electronic presentations. I would also like to thank Professor Patrick Haggard from the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London who is an important source